"I know," I said finally. "I won't go alone. Quinn and Atlas can come with me. You and Oona and Valeska should stay here and rest."
"Malin," he said.
"Have you talked to your grandmother?" I asked, and that was enough of an emotional startle to get him to stop arguing about whether or not he should go with me.
"Not yet. Did you talk to her while I was gone?"
I shook my head. "I didn't know how to contact her, and I wouldn't have known what to say even if I had."
"I should call her now."
He dug through his bag looking for his cell phone, and I snuck out while he was distracted, hoping we had put that argument to bed.
THIRTY-NINE
The argument was not put to bed, but eventually Atlas and Quinn were able to convince Asher that they would be more than enough protection for me.
Samael had wired Atlas money, so we rented a sturdy little side-by-side ATV. It was basically like if a golf cart and a Humvee had a weird little baby.
The sky was rumbling, and long tendrils of lightning were spidering through the clouds. We didn't want to risk getting caught in the rain, and also, Asher was right: Ereshkigal would be sending someone after the spear as soon as she was able. So I wanted to get it to Odin as quickly as possible.
Quinn and I sat in the two seats of the ATV, with her driving, and Atlas sat on the rear rack, hanging on to the backs of our seats so he didn't bounce off. The forest surrounding the Caana temple was dense, but it wasn't impenetrable. Quinn had to take it slow in several spots, but when we got on a well-worn game trail, it was smooth sailing.
As much as I would've loved to take the vehicle up the many stairs of the temple--and as much as Quinn assured me that the ATV could handle it--I didn't want to risk desecrating an ancient pyramid to make my life a little easier. So we parked at the bottom and made the arduous trek up the stone steps to the grassy mezzanine, and then waited for Odin.
And we waited, and waited some more.
Because of the cloud cover, I couldn't see where the moon was at or how high it might be, but Oona had been certain that it wouldn't be until after midnight this time--12:44 A.M., to be precise. He'd been a little late last time, but he still arrived before midnight, and now it was going on 1:30 in the morning.
"At least we have a show," Atlas commented.
He was sitting on the steps, watching the dazzling array of lights above us. Every few seconds the sky would light up as another burst of lightning shot between the clouds. So far the flashes had yet to hit the ground, instead preferring to leap between clouds. Most of it was bright white, the way it always was, but the occasional burst appeared to be shades of purple and blue.
The strangest part wasn't even the unusually colored lightning--it was the eerie silence that accompanied it. There hadn't been a single clap of thunder or even a faint rumble. It was silent flashes, without a hint of rain or any sign of an incoming storm.
"It is sort of amazing," Quinn agreed tiredly. She sat up a little higher on the steps than Atlas, leaning back on her elbows, with her legs crossed at the ankles. Her gaze was on the sky, but her expression was far more indifferent than amazed. "Any sign of Odin yet?"
"He'll be here soon," I insisted for the tenth time, but with less and less conviction each time I said it.
"Do you have any way to contact him?"
I paced. "No. He just told me to meet him here. So far, he seems to know how to find me when he wants to."
"What do you think the holdup could be?" Quinn asked.
"I don't know," I said, but my mind was racing through a thousand scenarios, all equally horrible.
"I mean..." Quinn stopped and ran a hand through her hair. "He couldn't be hurt or anything, could he?"
"I don't know," I repeated.
"Can Vanir gods even be hurt or held captive?" Quinn asked, but it sounded more like she was thinking aloud. "I know they're powerful, but they're not all-powerful. They have weaknesses, right?"
"Everyone has weaknesses," Atlas said.
As if to punctuate his statement, a gust of wind suddenly came up, breaking through the stillness. It had been warm since we'd been in Belize, even in the dead of night, but the wind brought a chill with it, dropping the temperature by several digits within a matter of minutes.
"How long are we going to wait here?" Quinn asked.
"As long as it takes," I replied firmly.
"You want to stay here until the sun comes up?" Quinn asked.
"Of course I don't want to, but I will." I stopped pacing to look over at her. "What else am I supposed to do? I don't know how to reach him, and I don't know what to do with the spear."
"I understand the situation," Quinn said, keeping her tone calm and reasonable. "But I'm being realistic here. There's a storm coming, Malin."
"Quinn's right," Atlas agreed, giving me an apologetic smile. "We don't have to go yet, but it won't be safe staying out here all night in a storm. We'll have to go back."
I looked away from them, instead scouring the sky for any signs of Odin or his ravens. "He'll be here," I said, then, more quietly, "He has to be."
We lapsed into a silence after that, and I was fine with it. The wind had picked up, blowing leaves and dust as it roared over the temple. I began pacing again, both to keep the chill at bay and because of the anxious energy coursing through me.
Then I realized that it wasn't exactly anxiety, and I couldn't feel the chill from the breeze anymore. I could still feel the wind rustling through my hair, but it was more like being aware of it and less actually feeling it.
My mouth tasted metallic, and a dull buzzing was growing around my heart. My muscles tensed, wanting to charge after everything.
This wasn't anxiety or impatience.
This was my Valkyrie instincts kicking in.
I stopped pacing, forcing myself to stand perfectly still. "Something's wrong."
"What?" Quinn asked, sitting up more.
"Do you feel it?" I looked over at her, and I saw the confusion in her green eyes.
"What do you feel?" Atlas asked, and he was already on his feet walking over to me.
Before I could answer, thunder rumbled. An angry deep roar that echoed throughout the ruins, and the hair on the back of my neck stood up.
"Maybe you sensed the storm?" Quinn suggested as she came down the stairs to join me and Atlas in the center of the mezzanine.
"No, I..." I trailed off as the thunder rumbled again, and the pressure grew in the base of my stomach.
I tilted my head, listening closely to the thunder. It was coming from the sky, but there was something beneath it--something closer. A murky growl mixing with it.
"That's not thunder," I said, and my hand went to the sword sheathed on my hip. I'd left Sigrun at the motel, deciding instead to take the dragon sword Kusanagi, and it felt cool and heavy against the palm of my hand.
By then we all heard it--the guttural growl of an enraged big cat. Then there it was, climbing up over the walls that surrounded the mezzanine. A massive beast of a cat, at least the size of a donkey, with paws as big as a bear's, and a brindled coat of dark gray fur.
It was a Mngwa, a violent predator imported from Tanzania centuries ago. It opened its mouth--revealing a mouthful of giant sharp teeth--to let out another short burst of a roar, and this time another Mngwa replied as it came up the stairs toward us.
FORTY
The three of us--two Valkyries and the son of a Valkyrie--should be enough to ward off two hungry giant jungle cats. Or at least that's what I told myself as they circled toward us.
We stood with our backs together, each of us brandishing our own weapon. I had Kusanagi, while Quinn had brought her Valkyrie sword Eir, but it still didn't glow its usual bright blue, despite the fact that we were surrounded. It wouldn't be as powerful, since we weren't assigned to kill these immortals, but it should be effective enough.
"Are we allowed to kill them?" Atlas asked as the Mngwas circled around us, talking
to each other in their quick guttural bursts as their stubby tails swished behind them.
"Let's make sure they don't kill us, and we'll take it from there," Quinn said.
One of the Mngwas swatted at her, but Quinn swung her sword right back, and it stepped away. But a second later the other Mngwa swatted at me, and then the first cat moved closer. They were feeling us out, checking for weaknesses.
"Maybe you should use the spear," Quinn said through gritted teeth.
"No, it's not for that," Atlas insisted before I could respond, but it was a moot point. The spear was safely inside my bag, and I wouldn't be able to get to it--not before one of the Mngwas pounced on me.
Thunder rolled overhead, and the cats had apparently tired of testing us. They had made their decision.
The larger of the two leapt at Atlas, going right for his throat. He tried to stab it, but the creature knocked the sword from his hand and had him laid on the ground within seconds.
I dove at the Mngwa, driving my sword between its shoulder blades. It let out an angry yowl and swatted at me. I ducked, but one of its massive claws managed to connect with my forearm, slicing through my skin and muscle.
Quinn was busy taking on the other Mngwa, trying to chase it off the temple, but I barely had a chance to look at her. Atlas was bleeding and making an awful wet bubbling sound when he breathed, and the big cat wasn't keen on letting him go.
I was hoping that after I stabbed it, it would come after me, but both of its back legs were firmly planted on Atlas's torso as it swung at me and hissed. I stayed back just out of its reach and crouched down, waiting.
As soon as the beast turned its attention back on Atlas, I charged at it and dove onto its back. I stabbed it again, this time in the side, and when the cat tried to buck me off, I twisted the knife in deeper, lodging it between the ribs so I could use it as a handle.
The Mngwa ran in a circle, finally getting off of Atlas, and bit at me. To avoid getting a chunk taken out of me, I untwisted the knife, and fell free off the cat.
But now it was pissed and bleeding, and I was lying on the ground. When it stalked toward me, I kicked it in the face as hard as I could--twice in a row--before it let out an angry yowl and stepped back. It pawed its face, and I saw that I had managed to break one of its fangs, and the broken bit had gotten embedded in its lip.
Just then, lightning shot down--striking the top of the temple. A deafening crack of thunder reverberated through the air. Both of the Mngwas shrank back in fear, and then, bloodied and battered, they took off down the temple.
Quinn was still standing, and other than a quartet of claw marks that tore through her pants and into her thigh, she appeared okay. Atlas, on the other hand, was not doing well at all. His torso had been torn up by the Mngwa's back claws, and his shoulder had a bite taken out of it. But his throat--pouring blood onto the ground around him, as he sputtered and tried futilely to hold it in--that was the scariest part.
"We've got to get him out of here," Quinn said.
"Go get the ATV," I told her as I crouched beside Atlas. "Bring it up here. We don't have much time."
But she was already running, racing down the steps. I ripped off part of Atlas's shirt and held it against his neck, pressing it to the wound. With my other hand, I took his hand and held it. His hand was so much bigger, stronger, but his grip was weak, and his eyes were wide and terrified as he stared up at me.
"It's gonna be okay, Atlas," I promised him. "We're gonna get help."
By the time Quinn made it up with the ATV, his hand was barely even holding mine anymore. He'd closed his eyes, but he was struggling. Quinn and I managed to lift his hulking frame and get him in the passenger seat. There were only two seats, so I knelt behind him on the rear rack, leaning forward with one arm around him holding him in the chair and the other hanging on to the metal ATV frame.
"Hang on!" Quinn shouted before throwing the vehicle into gear and bouncing down the stairs.
It was a rough ride, but time was of the essence. Once we were down and out onto the game trail--which was relatively smooth sailing compared to the rest of the jungle--she asked, "What the hell happened up there?"
"I have no idea," I said, narrowly dodging a branch as we drove through the dark forest.
"Do you think Odin sent them?" Quinn asked. "Or Ereshkigal?"
"I can't think right now," I said, which wasn't a total lie. I didn't want to think. I didn't want to worry. I wanted to be out of the woods and at the hospital, where a doctor would tell me that Atlas was going to be okay, that everything would be okay.
FORTY-ONE
Everything was not okay.
Quinn and I returned to the motel an hour later, our clothes covered in drying blood. The doctors had stitched us up--her thigh had been worse than I'd thought and took over forty stitches, while my arm only needed a few.
But there hadn't been anything they could do for Atlas. He was gone before we even made it to the hospital.
I was too numb to cry, but Oona wept as we told them what had happened. Asher's face hardened, and I could see his jaw clenching. He stood off to the side of the room, inhaling tensely through his nose and staring out the window at the lightning storm that had yet to produce any rain.
I sat with Oona, rubbing her back gently as she softly cried, since that seemed like the only thing I could do to make anything even a little bit better. Valeska sat on the arm of the couch beside her with downcast eyes.
Quinn, meanwhile, was pacing the room like a caged animal. Her silver hair had been pulled up in a messy bun to keep it out of the blood. Atlas had been bleeding so profusely that our moving him around had left us covered in it. Her left thigh was bandaged in layers of gauze, but that didn't slow her down.
"Where in the hell was Odin?" Quinn asked, demanding an answer she knew I didn't have.
"I don't know," I replied wearily.
"He should've been there," she persisted. "This never should've happened!"
I licked my lips before saying, "No, it shouldn't have."
"Where was he? How could he have left us out there like that?" Quinn ranted, and as she went on, her tone kept getting shriller and more unstable. "Why didn't he help us?"
"I don't know!" I snapped in frustration. "I don't know where he is or what he's doing! I know as much as you do, okay?"
Quinn stopped pacing to look at me. "Well, I know that it really seems like we're all totally fucked right about now." Her eyes were daring me to disagree with her, but I couldn't.
"Maybe we should all take a step back and catch our breath." Oona sniffled and wiped at her eyes. "We've all been through a lot."
"That's true," Valeska agreed wearily. "And we've still got a lot more left to go, I imagine." She lifted her eyes and let her gaze bounce slowly between Quinn and me. "What are we going to do from here?"
I ran my hand through my long tangles of hair and exhaled. "I'll have to contact Samael and let him know about Atlas, so he can make arrangements for getting him back home."
"Well, that's a start," Valeska said.
"Could they have been after the spear?" Asher asked quietly, speaking for the first time in quite a while. He'd been standing with his back to me, staring out the window, but now he turned around, facing me.
"I don't think so. I mean, they're immortal, but they're animals," I reasoned. "I don't think they really follow orders, and they never went anywhere near my bag."
"But this isn't normal behavior," Quinn insisted, as if anyone had been pretending that any of this was normal. "Not for Mngwas or any jungle cat to attack in the middle of a lightning storm on top of a temple."
"The animals have been acting really strangely lately." Oona leaned forward, resting her arms on her legs. "Remember the shunka warakins that went after us outside of the Gates of Kurnugia? And that olitau that flew over the walls?"
Everything about tonight had been bizarre. The storm, Odin's absence, the fact that I sensed the Mngwas before they arrived even though I
wasn't assigned to kill them.
"What if they're targeting us? Because we're Valkyries?" Quinn asked, her voice still tilting toward shrill.
She wasn't pacing, but she kept shifting her weight from one foot to the other. She couldn't stand still. Her lips were pursed, her eyes wide, and I realized that for the first time I was seeing what she looked like when she was afraid.
"But the only reason we're still alive is because we're Valkyries," I argued. "Atlas is a huge strong dude, and they knocked him down like he was nothing. We could only fight them so well because our blood weakens them."
"Was," Oona corrected me quietly. "Atlas was a strong dude."
"It's not logical or rational. You said it yourself--they're animals," Quinn countered, practically talking over Oona. "But a shark doesn't make a conscious decision to chase a wounded animal. It's something instinctual."
"We're not wounded animals," I said. "I mean, we weren't. Not before they attacked us."
"But they can sense weakness," Valeska said as she considered Quinn's theory. "That's probably why they went after Atlas first, and they must think you're getting weaker, too, or they wouldn't have braved attacking him while you were around."
"Oh, hell," Asher muttered and turned to look back out the window.
"That would make sense. The Jorogumo affected you so much worse than it should've," Quinn said, referring to my first run-in with Amaryllis Mori when I sent her to the underworld.
Oona leaned back on the couch, taking it all in. "Whatever is happening in Kurnugia is affecting your Valkyrie powers."
"We can't stay here," Asher said emphatically. "We're too close to the entrance to Kurnugia. The underworld has a stronger hold here."
"I'll call Samael, and we can get things figured out." I rubbed the back of my neck. "But you're right. We should head out in the morning."
There really wasn't anything more for us to do in Caana City. I couldn't keep going to the temple hoping that Odin would show up, especially not after what had happened tonight.
Besides that, he was a Vanir god. He could find me.
"I need some air and something to drink," Quinn announced and started walking toward the door.